Record-breaking: Ethiopia plants more than 350 trees in 12 hours

CAIRO – 4 August 2019:Breaking the record, Ethiopia planted more than 350 million trees in only 12 hours last week, beating the 2016 record of India which planted only about 60 million trees.

In response to Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s Initiative “Green Legacy,” 11 areas have been planted with millions of trees to combat the climate change and its impact, deforestation.

View a detailed breakdown of #GreenLegacy seedlings planted at zonal level within each region through our interactive map: https://t.co/ugpZ4c7pMEpic.twitter.com/bV2XrplnMv

— Office of the Prime Minister - Ethiopia (@PMEthiopia) July 31, 2019

According to a study conducted by the FAO in 2017, the forest area in Ethiopia which represents 52 percent of its lands has declined by 0.8 percent from 14 million hectares in 1999 and 12.4 million hectares in 2015 due to the increasing population and decreasing rate of annual rainfall as a result of climate change.


Ethiopians plant trees- photo courtesy of the Ethiopian Prime Minister Office

Moreover, a study was published by Science in July and revealed that the universe has to cultivate 1 billion hectares of trees to help curb carbon dioxide emissions globally and limit the impacts of climate change.

Scientists estimated that growing 0.9 billion trees can absorb 25 percent of carbon dioxide, saying “We estimate that if we cannot deviate from the current trajectory, the global potential canopy cover may shrink by ~223 million hectares by 2050, with the vast majority of losses occurring in the tropics. Our results highlight the opportunity of climate change mitigation through global tree restoration but also the urgent need for action.”